Azoamidine compounds have been useful as a polymerization initiator in polymerization of acrylamide, allylamine, vinyl pyrrolidone, etc., in production of cationic polymers and in various kinds of emulsion polymerizations.
However, those compounds have generally been used as their mineral acid salts such as hydrogen halide salts, and therefore they are accompanied with such defects that they may corrode manufacturing equipment in some cases and, in case where a polymer obtained by polymerization using those compounds as a polymerization initiator is used in cationic electrodeposition, rust-inhibiting effect of the dry paint film formed thereby may be reduced.
In order to dissolve those problems, some organic acid salts such as organic sulfonic acid salts of azoamidines have been evaluated (JP-A 2-261, etc.), but they have not yet been made into practical use because of their insufficient stability.
On the other hand, graft copolymers and block copolymers have been attracted as functional polymers which are expected to show various kinds of functions effectively, and there have actively been conducted such studies as synthesizing graft copolymers and block copolymers utilizing a terminal functional group of polymers obtained with the use of azo compounds having functional groups. Therefore, azo compounds having terminal functional groups have vigorously been required.
In compliance with this requirement, the present inventors have already developed azoamidine compounds wherein an .alpha.-amino acid residue is introduced as azoamidine compounds containing reactive functional groups and free from the problems of known azoamidine compounds which are caused by their form of mineral acid salts, and have filed patent applications (JP-A 63-310860) relating to those compounds.
However, all of the azoamidine compounds wherein an .alpha.-amino acid residue is introduced, which are disclosed in the above Patent Publication, are not enough in their solubility into water, methanol and other solvents and thus they have not yet been made into practical use. That is, there have not yet been found azoamidine compounds having such characteristics as having reactive functional groups at the terminal position, containing no halogen atoms and showing sufficient solubility into water, methanol, and other solvents as well, of which realization has recently been demanded.